August 6, 2007 – A dozen local students who have spent the summer at HCL will wrap up their library jobs next week as they prepare to head back to high school come September. The students, ranging in age from 14 to 18, all attend Cambridge and Boston schools and have spent the last several weeks in libraries and units throughout HCL, performing a wide array of tasks, including filing, labeling, answering phones, and staffing circulation desks.

It’s all part of the Summer Youth Employment Program (SYEP), a program run by Harvard since 2001 that gives high school students an early opportunity to experience an office environment. For many of the teenagers, who work 25 to 35 hours a week, it’s their first job. The program supplements the real-life work experience with weekly lunch speakers who talk to students both about Harvard and careers.

Vincent Duong, who will be a junior at Boston Latin come this September, is serving as an assistant in the Judaica Division in Widener Library. There he’s helping with a variety of tasks, including labeling books—which, he notes, isn’t as simple as it seemed—and computer work, which he definitely favors. "It’s pretty good," he says. "A lot better than other jobs."

Second-year SYEP participant Oyinkansola Ayobiojo says she initially didn’t remember how to work the HCL phone system but otherwise, she says, "I felt like I never left." Ayobiojo, who will be a senior at Boston Latin next month, is splitting her second HCL summer between Human Resource Services and Financial Services. In addition to handling reception duties, filing, and labeling, she is helping HR create PowerPoint presentations and aiding Financial Services with database and invoice updates. She points to the Wednesday seminars held at the Center for Workplace Development as a program highlight.

This summer marks HCL’s fourth year of involvement with the Summer Youth Employment Program. A learning experience for the students, it also helps HCL units meet staffing needs when many employees are taking summer vacations. Units that take on a student worker for the summer receive special funding from the Librarian’s Office.